OK, now they're starting to scare me...

[Ryantology]

I wouldn't count on it, their seats are quite safe from anything but primary challenges due to gerrymandering. Thats actually the root of this entire problem.

It's the "moderate" (such as they are) Republicans in not-so-safe districts who'll be most likely to lose their seats. That's why they're freaking out and threatening to caucus with the Dems on this issue. Hence, Boener had to short-circut that possibility with his new one-man-filibuster powers. If I were a non Tea-brained Republican, I'd switch parties to "independent". They need to get the GOP stink off of them, fast.

Nothing would benefit America more than a fractured Republican Party. Demographic creep will consume the moderates more quickly that way.

There's been a lot of cautionary talk about the Teahadists being safe in their districts. This would be important, except that the Tea Party caucus itself is nowhere near large enough to ever constitute a majority in any branch of government, so once they can no longer wag the tail of moderate Republicans (or, once the numbers of those moderates dwindle to the point where the GOP as a whole can no longer hold a majority of seats), they'll just be a marginalized group of foaming lunatics who can't do anything more than harm their own constituents.